Bain Capital & Golden Gate Capital took BMC Software private in 2013 at a time that it was struggling in the Service Management space against an upstart in ServiceNow that was gaining tremendous market share. Since then, ServiceNow has continued to grow while BMC went dark and presumably worked to clean up the product line and offerings.
Just recently, many in the industry suspected that a new public offering was in the near future. Something big might have been brewing but I don’t know anyone saw this as it. Maybe the itch that BMC Software hasn’t been able to scratch since going private will be addressed with the latest news.
According to a Bloomberg Technology News article and Reuters, it looks like BMC Software and CA are considering a merger. According to the August 2016 Gartner Magic Quadrant, BMC was in the leadership quadrant slightly ahead of ServiceNow in terms of “Completeness of Vision” but lagging considerably in terms of “Ability to Execute”. CA was in the “Niche Player” quadrant behind nearly all the other players.
So the question that will need to be answered, if this comes to fruition is, will the niche Service Management capabilities that CA offers enable BMC to catch up and possibly overtake ServiceNow? Did the Service Management capabilities that CA offers even play a major role in the possible merger or is it the customer base and growth in other segments? Will a potentially merged company simply be a temporary step before the private equity holders try to spin off multiple public offerings into various market segments?
The answers to these questions and whether this merger happens are unknown right now…. Stay tuned it’s going to be an interesting road ahead for these two companies and every company that uses their products.
Add your comments below and let us know what you think of this possible change in the Enterprise Software landscape.
